One of the most fundamental things a philosopher does is to ask why. When someone says “you should do x” or “y is good,” it seems to me, the true lover of wisdom needs to ask why this is the case. If someone tells me I should do something and can’t provide a reason, I see this as grounds for questioning whether it really is something I should do at all. Nietzsche, if he does nothing else, shows us that the things we take as obvious may well not be so.

So what happens when we try to take our reasons all the way down? When we continue asking why we should do anything? We begin to get to a complex meta-ethical question: what constitutes a reason for action? What is it to have a reason to do something? (Warning: this will be an abstract and theoretical post, but it is important to fundamental questions like why we should do anything at all.)

There are at least three things that this last question could mean, three things we could be saying when we speak of having reasons. I like to distinguish the different kinds of reasons in terms of grammar: it’s so far the most precise way I’ve found of spelling them out. There is on one hand a difference of case, between ablative and dative reasons; and on the other a difference of person, between third-person and first-person reasons. English has the second of these distinctions but not the first.

I know the distinction between ablative and dative from my study of Sanskrit and Pali (and to a lesser extent Latin) grammar; the same distinction, I believe, is there in Greek. (It’s not there in German, which has only a dative and no ablative.) In Sanskrit, ablative and dative case endings can both be used to express what we would normally call reasons; but they are very different kinds of reasons. The ablative case describes a cause; it describes the reason why we did something (or why we’re doing it or will do it). The dative case describes a purpose; it describes our reason to do something. The ablative in this sense is translated with “because”; the dative, with “in order to.”

So when we speak of reasons, it can be helpful to specify whether we’re speaking of reasons in the sense expressed by the dative, or only by the ablative. Ablative reasons are the reasons that natural scientists are best at expressing; they’re the only kinds of reasons discovered by chemistry or physics. Everything in the universe acts according to ablative reasons: the rock fell because it had been dropped (and because of gravity). Essentially, they are causes; the “why” in an ablative reason can be replaced with a “how.” In Aristotle’s scheme of four explanations, they are efficient explanations.

Dative reasons, by contrast, are final explanations; they have to do with purpose, aims, teleology. On Aristotle’s understanding, everything had a dative reason; for a modern scientific understanding, this is not the case. There is no purpose to rocks falling or the sun shining. There is, however, some sort of purpose in the biological action of lifeforms, even on a purely scientific explanation. We cannot explain the movements of, say, blood clotting in a wound entirely on the basis of chemical and physical movement; we explain the blood clotting much more effectively if we can talk about what it’s for, namely to protect the wound and stop bleeding. Purpose is such a central part of biological explanation that, until Darwin, it was the most obvious and preferred proof for the existence of God. Everything biological, from the cell to the ecosystem, acts with some purpose to the preservation and reproduction of life; how could this have happened without the action of a God? Nobody had a good answer to that question until Darwin; ever since then, evolution replaced God in explanations, and people have made attempts to base ethics on evolution (usually failing miserably).

It’s dative and not ablative reasons that are of interest to me here. Ablative reasons help us explain the action of the universe; but they tell us less of interest for ethics. To ask “why should we do something?” we need to ask about purpose.

Some – especially Kant – would step in and require a further distinction among dative reasons. The best way I’ve found of putting this distinction is also grammatical: third-person versus first-person reasons. (My grad-school colleague Drew Schroeder used this distinction to help explain Kant to me, though I don’t think Kant himself puts it in those terms.) When a biologist explains blood clotting in terms of its purpose, Kant would say, that explanation too has nothing to do with what actions we should actually take. The purpose of our action has to come from within us.

Sociologists and psychologists can easily explain actions in dative terms. This is clearest in the case of functionalists like Talcott Parsons, for whom basically every social phenomenon can be explained in terms of its purpose for society at large, but pretty much every social scientist will explain actions in terms of some sort of purpose, including individual self-interest or evolutionary fitness. But they’re still explaining action causally, looking at the social or biological variables that cause one course of action to be taken rather than not taken. In the end these third-person dative reasons still turn out to be efficient explanations: we ask what something is for only in order to explain what caused it. First-person reasons are different: they’re the reasons that we use for choice and deliberation in an action.

On the internalist view, I think, these distinctions look a bit less important. If our reasons for action come down to our existing desires or other motivations, then it may well be sufficient to say that we want X because it gives us pleasure, and it gives us pleasure because our upbringing predisposes us that way. But I think it’s that very way of phrasing the question that looks suspicious to the externalist. Should we really take a view that’s that conservative – that just leaves the preferences formed by genes and upbringing as they are? Don’t we want to have better reasons than just being slaves of our pasts? It’s the sorts of judgements implied in those questions – the idea that it is better to make a free and rational choice – that Kant appeals to, and I don’t think it’s too hard to see the appeal in his view.

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67 thoughts on “What it means to have a reason for action”

Did somebody say Kant? :) You’re right that Kant didn’t speak of first vs third person reasons. But close. He argued that we cannot help but see ourselves as natural beings (thus yes, mere slaves to our pasts) and yet at the same time as free moral agents. Likewise for any object, we can see it as the mere collection of phenomena -for us- and as something which exists beyond what our limited senses ‘give’ to us.

I’m diving into, or perhaps merely brushing through, Christine Korsgaard’s excellent “Sources of Normativity” now – and several of her points seem to parallel yours, including a fun passage tracing some ideas from Freud and Nietzsche right back to their true originator: Immanuel Kant…

And tangentially, John Searle gives a very humorous example of the fact that we must see ourselves as free agents – of a determinist at a restaurant who is asked what he’d like to order responding, “I don’t know, I’ll just have whatever I order.”

Yea, I figured Korsgaard’s Harvard connection might be at work there… As for free will/determinism, I’ve long given up on all of that. Kant solved it. Everything in the world of appearances is causally determined, but we must still act as if we are free. Seeing ourselves from the 3rd person standpoint (as an observer) is good at times, but when it’s time to order dinner, we need to jump back in :)

I think Peter Strawson, who wrote a great book on Kant, has some insights on freedom. I will report on his views later in the week.

It seems to me that the central question on determinism is whether, if determinism is true, it makes any sense to suppose that we can freely deliberate, discuss, and arrive at a reasonable conclusion on the determinist thesis!

If determinism is true, than all processes, including mental processes of deliberation, ratiocination, etc., are determined by antecedent conditions or states and we would have no real or meaningful choice in directing our thought processes and faculties to ascertain whether determinism is true.

Hence, if determinism is true, it does not make sense to ask anyone to ascertain its plausibility.

Of course, the determinist herself also faces this quandary of explaining how free deliberation as a means of ascertaining and advocating the plausibility of the determinist thesis is possible for her!

The advocacy of determinism may be tainted by the same form of insincerity which afflicts the advocacy of philosophical skepticism or the denial of the possibility of knowledge.

“We certainly discussed freedom of the will, in the course of which Austin said to me, sotto voce, so as not to provoke Freddie Ayer, who was at the time a convinced determinist, “They all TALK about determinism and SAY they believe in it. I’ve never met a determinist in my life, I mean a man who really did believe in it as you and I believe that men are mortal. Have you?”

I cannot but agree with Justin. The opposition free will vs. determinism does not work because it opposes two things which are valid within different frameworks. We cannot avoid regarding ourselves as free agents, although we will keep on explaining the world according to deterministic laws.

(Suppose your toddler tells you “Dad, you are extra-ordinary!”. Could you convincingly argue that you are *not* extra-ordinary? Probably not, because for him/her your skills are so extra-ordinary that you must be magic or the like. The fact that you got accostumed with your skills does not prove that they are just “ordinary”.)

A distinction between hard and soft determinism might add an interesting nuance. Hard determinism is the view that metaphysical determinism implies the impossibility of moral responsibility (and, I suppose, dative reasons). Soft determinists like Hume or Mill, however, think metaphysical determinism is compatible with moral responsibility, and I’d add dative reasons, too.

It’s too easy to lampoon hard determinism, but soft determinism is more plausible (even if soft determinists are ultimately fooling themselves, too). As Mill and Hume point out, our entire practice of praise and blame in fact relies on praising and blaming people for actions that, as Mill puts it, “flow from their character.” Nobody (aside from philosophers and theologians) really worries about whether your actions were some sort of metaphysically bizarre uncaused cause; even though many people *say* they want such a thing, their practice doesn’t at all rely on it. I personally can’t make sense of the idea of an uncaused cause, or how such a thing would be any different from a completely random occurrence, which couldn’t be a basis for moral responsibility at all.

A soft determinist gambit might work for dative reasons, too. Even if at some metaphysically ultimate level dative reasons reduce to ablative reasons, we could still be justified in taking certain *kinds* of ablative reasons as dative reasons: for instance, those that fit with one’s general rational and moral character. But maybe this isn’t any different than an internalist theory of moral motivation. Or maybe I’m just one of these people that Thill thinks are fooling themselves all the time (but that’s just in his character to say that, so I’ll forgive him).

I was just joking around, and when joking sometimes exaggerations are fun! But then humor never comes across quite the same way in a text format. Sorry. But, to defend my lame attempt at humor just a little bit, you have declared on this thread and elsewhere that people who seriously advocate skepticism and determinism are somehow fooling themselves into thinking that they are making meaningful claims. I disagree with that assessment, but I don’t want to dig up that debate again.

You are right that I don’t know your character very well, but I was just working from Mill’s point that if I DID know yours or someone else’s character well enough, I could pretty accurately predict what you or someone else are going to do. I merely predicted that you would take my tentative endorsement of determinism as evidence that I was putting forth a meaningless claim. But as you pointed out, I don’t know enough about your character to make an accurate prediction on the matter!

Here’s the textual evidence from your earlier post: “The advocacy of determinism may be tainted by the same form of insincerity which afflicts the advocacy of philosophical skepticism or the denial of the possibility of knowledge.” If I have somehow misrepresented “insincerity” with “fooling themselves” please explain the difference.

Also, Thill, I only make those kinds of jokes with people I like and respect. It’s a weird personal trait of mine. So, sorry if it came across as rude or disrespectful – or worse yet, fallaciously ad hominem!

“If I have somehow misrepresented “insincerity” with “fooling themselves” please explain the difference.”

Well, “insincerity” is tantamount to “fooling others” rather than “fooling oneself”.

An insincere person leads you believe that they believe something when they are merely professing it.

Thus, philosophical skeptics (those who deny that we know anything) and advocates of determinism lead us to believe that their advocacy of these positions implies that they are committed to them. But given the implications of their positions, they couldn’t possibly be committed to them. Hence, the charge of insincerity.

Thanks for the clarification, but I’m still not convinced. I don’t think you mean that proponents of skepticism (of which there are very, very few) and determinism (of which there are far more, the vast majority of which are soft determinists who don’t deny personal responsibility) meet in secret cabals to deliberately engineer their spreading of nonsense for some nefarious anti-commonsense purposes. If that’s not what you mean, I’m not sure what you really think. Why would proponents of skepticism or determinism deliberately argue for positions that they know are false? Maybe epistemologists talk about skepticism to further their careers? But at least 95% of epistemologists assume skepticism is false and use it as a means toward developing some positive theory. Maybe determinists are under the sway of scientism? In any case, it strikes me as far less charitable to think that there are philosophers going around being knowingly insincere for non-philosophical reasons, than to think they have merely made honest philosophical mistakes.

Why should philosophers be immune to insincerity? Their ancestors, the priests, weren’t immune to it! Hardly!

The charge of insincerity is actually very charitable compared to alternatives!

If an adult person tells me that she doesn’t have a body or that none of us have bodies, I can only explain the fact that she is making that bizarre claim (There are claims more bizarre. Try “ontological nihilism” or the view that nothing exists! LOL) in one of the following ways:

1. She is joking (and her “argument” for the claim is also a joke).

2. But if she is dead serious (and let’s say, she even wrote a paper in defense of her claim), then certainly she is either:

2A. Professing to believe in something she knows is absurd (insincerity),

OR

2B. Suffering from a mental disorder (Mental disorder is a likely cause of Repeatedly advocating bizarre or absurd views. Since I do hold that there is “religious madness”, I am inclined not to dismiss the view that there may also be “philosophical madness”!)

OR

3. She simply doesn’t see the absurdity of her denial that we have bodies. (This , of course, means stupidity, given the inability to see the obvious!)

OR

4. She just graduated from a graduate school in a philosophy department (awash in postmodernist, relativist, subjectivist, “pluralist”, anti-science hogwash!) in North America or Europe! LOL Just kidding!

Now, if she is not joking, and not trying to illustrate what absurdity is, then she is seriously advocating the claim.

If she is seriously advocating the claim, then she is either insincere, or suffering from a mental disorder, or stupid.

Let’s say we rule out mental disorder, even in the face of the fact that all of us tread a thin line between irrationality and insanity in some domains!

This only leaves us with insincerity or stupidity as a likely explanation of her advocacy of the bizarre claim that none of us have bodies.

Let’s be “charitable” and say that she is insincere rather than stupid!

Why would she be insincere? Why would she advocate, or profess to believe, a claim which she doesn’t really believe?

Well, why is anyone insincere?

Why would I profess to “fear God Almighty” and yet participate in planning or approving bombing campaigns to slaughter thousands of innocent human beings in distant lands?

Ah, the stuff of all those “mysteries of existence”, philosophers like prattle about! LOL

Why would a philosopher be insincere and advocate a position she doesn’t really believe in?

The advocacy of the position that we cannot know anything, or that we don’t, in fact, know anything, implies either that it is an exercise in joking, or in illustrating absurdity, or an expression of mental disorder, or or an inability (stupidity) to see the obvious fact that even to formulate the claim I must know a language, or, of course, an expression of insincerity.

And the insincerity manifested in professing something I don’t really believe can be due to a variety of factors, e.g., advocating absurd views to draw attention to oneself (I think Leibniz made a similar criticism of Berkeley on first hearing about the latter’s views), contradicting obvious or established truths again for the same motive, wanting to be perceived as a “challenging thinker” or a “radical”, wanting to be perceived as someone who has “gone beyond” the lowly common sense, wanting to sing loony tunes just to be dubbed “original”, wanting to join a fashionable coterie of philosophers, fear of exclusion or more serious consequences, e.g., loss of livelihood or privileges, and so on.

Re “Soft Determinism”:

In what sense is it “determinism”?

And, most importantly, what is its conception of “free choice”?

Unless we know the answer to these questions, we can’t understand the meaning of the claim that “Determinism is compatible with freedom of choice.”

Of course, it may all hinge merely on how the crucial terms are defined, as it usually does in a discipline on which Hamlet may have had the “last word”! LOL

Or, perhaps, advocating absurd views is a form of irrationality no different from believing in something, e.g., belief in an all-loving God, Angels, or Bodhisattvas, and such, despite knowing the evidence to the contrary?

All of this seems to suppose that your view that those views are absurd is somehow itself completely infallible and obvious to anyone. But isn’t it possible that some people simply disagree with your assessment of the overall situation without being insincere, stupid or mentally ill? Central to the principle of charity, in my opinion, is an epistemic humility according to which you admit that reasonable opponents could have reasons you don’t yet understand, and that they could turn out to be right even if they initially seem obviously wrong. For instance, I don’t really understand the source of your certainty on these matters or your motivation for thinking that reasonable, honest people are insincere, but I admit you could have good reasons I currently fail to understand.

Do you mean to say that you don’t understand why it is absurd to claim that we don’t know anything or that we can meaningfully deliberate on (hard) determinism given its central claims?

It is obvious that a person who claims that we don’t know anything is incoherent because this person must know a few things as a matter of necessary conditions for formulating the claim.

And it is obvious that if everything is determined by antecedent causes or states, I cannot meaningfully engage in any process of deliberation or the exercise of my faculties to understand whether the claim is true.

“But isn’t it possible that some people simply disagree with your assessment of the overall situation without being insincere, stupid or mentally ill?”

Logically possible? Sure. It is also logically possible for someone to hold that we are both aliens from a different galaxy telepathically “typing” our posts on this blog now. (This is actually rather mild compared to the absurdity of claiming that we don’t know anything or that we can’t know anything.)

Well, if you believe in a spherical earth, and you meet a flat-earth advocate, would you still tout the view that “some people simply disagree with your assessment of the overall situation without being insincere, stupid or mentally ill?”

“…epistemic humility according to which you admit that reasonable opponents could have reasons you don’t yet understand, and that they could turn out to be right even if they initially seem obviously wrong.”

How do we know that these are “reasonable opponents” without consideration of the nature of their beliefs?

The charges of absurdity and insincerity are raised after a patient hearing of the thesis of skepticism or (hard) determinism, the denial that we have bodies, etc., and seeing the implications of these claims, e.g., the skeptic doesn’t know the language in which he formulates the skeptical thesis, the (hard) determinist must have deliberated on determinism and asking us to deliberate on it while maintaining that everything is determined by antecedent states or conditions.

The notion that even after a claim is shown to be absurd one must continue to pretend that the advocate is reasonable in advancing the claim is not reasonable.

One might as well say that one ought to treat a liar as though he were a truth-teller even after the lie has been exposed.

Would you, sincerely, suggest that we should extend this “epistemic humility” to a Neo-Nazi who holds that a society based on constitutionally-mandated “Aryan” racial segregation and domination is better than present day liberal democracies?

It seems to me that to say that a position is absurd is a legitimate position to take (for the sake of argument or otherwise). To say that holders of the position are insincere, stupid or mentally ill is to make an ad hominum attack. This adds nothing to the debate (and is somewhat tedious).

In terms of attacking arguments as absurd — the trouble is that the attack says that the argument is not worthy of discussion. It shuts down any communication.

Thill, I think, for example, you would say that the notion of egolessness or anatta is absurd. This view shuts down any discussion of the point. So it is difficult to follow up with a question where you ground your assumption that ego or self exists. In fairness, you are not entirely unwilling to discuss thia and we have had some discussion of it. But it is difficult to get you to discuss where you ground a notion of self in a dynamic, changing and impermanent world.

Of course, it is always possible that I don’t understand simply because I am insincer, stupid or mentally ill!

As far as this business of not being able to help but see ourselves as free (or as Sartre provocatively puts it, being “condemned to be free”), I’ve never understood how this could possibly be a metaphysical point rather than a merely psychological one (Kant’s rather strained attempt to explain how noumenal freedom might be possible when he tries to solve the third antinomy seems to indicate he thinks it’s a metaphysical point).

If we actually care about whether humans are determined like the rest of the non-quantum universe, we should ask: couldn’t we in fact be causally determined even if we can’t help but think otherwise? Why should we place so much faith in what we happen to strongly believe? This hasn’t worked very well in biology, where humans for thousands of years were really, really sure that biological organisms just *had* to be intelligently designed or have Aristotelian intrinsic purposes. Couldn’t it be that, rather than it being a necessary part of human nature to think of ourselves as supernatural agents, Kantians and existentialists just don’t have a very good imagination about how to think of ourselves as determined?

I realize that we have all been talking about determinism as though it were clear thesis or theory.

But what is it actually?

Peter Strawson concedes in his famous essay “Freedom and Resentment” that he doesn’t know what exactly is the thesis of determinism and claims that it is a vague thesis, but he still goes ahead to discuss what is or is not compatible with it!

He indicates that he is aware of the difficulty in doing this, but he claims that even a vague idea of the determinist thesis means will suffice for the task of figuring out its logical relations with other claims or truths.

I am not willing to concede this crucial assumption in his argument. I will go into it in a comment later.

So, I would like to ask: What exactly is the thesis of determinism?

“All human choice and action is determined by antecedent causes.”?

What are these antecedent causes, or at least, types of causes? And what does it mean to say that they “determine” human choice and action?

“Determinism” sounds like an empirical claim. If so, it must be falsifiable.

Can the proponent of determinism, then, specify the conditions in which determinism would be falsified?

I don’t think determinism is an empirical claim. It’s a metaphysical claim on par with epistemological claims such as “all empirical claims must be falsifiable.” As such, it is not itself subject to straightforward verification or falsification (see also: the classic downfall of Logical Positivism). Like most interesting philosophical claims, we can never really know with deductive certainty whether it’s true or false for the entire universe, but we can amass what seem like plausible reasons for or against it. As Colin McGinn once wrote, “Philosophical theses can sometimes be assented to, but often they can expect only to be taken seriously.”

“I don’t think determinism is an empirical claim. It’s a metaphysical claim on par with epistemological claims such as “all empirical claims must be falsifiable.” As such, it is not itself subject to straightforward verification or falsification (see also: the classic downfall of Logical Positivism).”

I am convinced that falsifiability is a criterion of empirical statements.

This falsifiability criterion is itself subject to an empirical assessment.

We can examine paradigm cases of empirical claims and see whether they are all falsifiable, i.e., whether they exclude certain states of affairs.

Another approach is to argue that “empirical claim” implies “observational claim” and that this, in its turn, implies a falsifiable claim.

On this approach, an “unfalsifiable empirical claim” is an oxymoron.

Determinism: What is it about?

Dennett’s formulation, as you portray it, makes determinism a thesis about causation in the universe: causation is such that antecedent conditions inevitably and inexorably bring about one, and only one, consequent state of affairs.

I think a thesis about the nature of causation in the universe is certainly an empirical (hypo)thesis.

Therefore, it must be falsifiable.

Since determinism is an empirical (hypo)thesis, it must be falsifiable.

So, I ask again, what would falsify determinism?

Surely, diversity and novelty in the effects given the same causal conditions is at least, prima facie, evidence against determinism?

To clarify: Dennett admits causation might enter into it somehow, but he thinks this view is compatible with Humean views of causation (or more precisely, Humean views about how humans think about causation). Thus, he doesn’t think determinism relies on any substantial Newtonian sort of view of causation or any particular view of causation. He says there could be one possible future even with no real causal connection at all. So maybe it’s best to say that Dennett is trying to separate the basic point of determinism from any particular robust theory of causality.

One definition of determinism that Daniel Dennett discusses in his work on the issue is as follows: given a particular state of affairs at a particular moment, there is only one possible future state of affairs. I think this is a pretty good definition, since it doesn’t directly involve the conceptually-difficult idea of causation. Dennett also makes interesting points about why people are so troubled by determinism. He says it’s because we tend to imagine that if determinism is true, then it’s like there’s some other agent controlling us (the malevolent mindreader, the invisible jailer, etc.). He suggests that once we give up on these metaphors, determinism isn’t so scary.

“I would add that I don’t see much philosophical value in discussing claims about reality which lack “truth-content”, i.e. claims about reality which cannot be shown to be true or false.”

This is not surprising from the “Baloney Detective”. I appreciate that your statement speaks only to “philosophical value” and perhaps is just a position that philosophy is a quite narrow field, limited to logical inquiry.

Perhaps you could elaborate on what you see as the limits of logic, if you see any. Alternatively, the same question might be phrased as whether there are ways of knowing that are not based on logic. If so, what are these? For example, even with the scientific method, an insight is the starting point of the inquiry. Logic is used to verify the insight and is, therefore, an afterthought (useful as it may be). Perhaps this implies that there is a base level of knowing that is beyond logic. But maybe you have a different view.

Would fists be allowed? j/k. I would be honored to join such a panel but I can’t think of a philosophy conference that would have us; or that we could all feasibly reach in person. (but that’s not ruling out entirely)

Btw, Ethan’s mention of Dennett had me thinking to/from meditation tonight: “given a particular state of affairs at a particular moment, there is only one possible future state of affairs. I think this is a pretty good definition, since it doesn’t directly involve the conceptually-difficult idea of causation.”

No idea of causation!? And yet ‘only one possible future state’… But how do we get from state T to T+1 in this necessary fashion? And necessity too, Kant pointed out, is a metaphysical/rational concept, never given by the senses.

But then I think you covered all of that, Thill.

So Dennett is either calling upon some mysterious agency to ensure that there is only one possible future state of affairs, or he is relying on causation. And causation, as a feature of reason and not the empirical realm, cannot itself be proven or disproved, but must be trusted (we must have faith, Kant used ‘glaube,’ in such things) because it holds such explanatory power in our lived experience. Doubt it if you must, but you *cannot* live truly in a state of doubt (again the self deception already discussed).

Isn’t the problem that the future doesn’t exist? It is nothing more than a projection from the present — an idea. Since our present seems fixed and flowing from past causes, our projection of a “future present” carries forward this concept of a single possible future.

In fact, it is all very interesting. The past is a memory (and an imperfect and unreliable one at that). The future doesn’t exist. And our concept of a present moment is dependent upon our concept of past and future. There is something that is happening (or appears very vividly) — but when we call it the present, we are doing that only by creating relationships with mental constructs. This is not to dismiss the relative truth of our ordinary lives — just to consider whether that is the only truth that philosophy is equiped to address.

This essentially is the same question I asked Thill above about the limits (if any) of logic — since logic only operates in the relative sphere.

Jim, I don’t know why you think you will be “disqualified”. There are some participants in these conferences who are not academicians (assuming that you are not one).

Anyway, if we continue our discussions on this blog into the future, I thought it would be a good idea to get together in a panel discussion forum at some conference and share evolving perspectives or views.

As to your question: “Alternatively, the same question might be phrased as whether there are ways of knowing that are not based on logic.”

Don’t we already know that we know many things immediately and non-inferentially?

For instance, every person has an immediate knowledge of his or her own existence.

Knowledge of sensations of pain and pleasure is also immediate and non-inferential.

And, this may be controversial or problematic for some philosophers, I also hold that our knowledge of the existence of everyday physical objects is immediate and non-inferential.

I may take recourse to inferences to demonstrate or explain the existence of a physical object, but I don’t need to make inferences, except in unusual circumstances or conditions, to know that it’s a tree that I am seeing as I turn my head towards the window right now.

But if you have in mind some other (alleged) way of knowing which is immediate and non-inferential, I would be interested in learning about it.

“Enlightenment”?

Well, whatever it is, it is a form of knowledge. Since knowledge is always knowledge of something, we need to know what it is that we know when we are “enlightened”.

Once it is clarified what the knowledge that we dub “Enlightenment” pertains to, then we can try and figure out whether this knowledge is based on inference or whether it is non-inferential and immediate.

Thanks Thill. I would certainly enjoy getting together in the real world at some point. I have enjoyed these conversations. And I have even begun to be inspired to try to fill in my lack of knowledge of philosophy. On this point, there was an interesting review in the NY Times Book Review of a new book on Friedrich Nietzsche (American Nietzsche by Ratner-Rosenhagen, Univ. of Chicago Press). Among other things, the review points out Nietzche’s great debt to Emerson. I may pick this book up.

To try to answer your question, we have discussed these issues before; I disagree that “every person has an immediate knowledge of his or her own existence” and that “knowledge is always knowledge of something”. I would agree with the first statement if it were that “every person assumes his or her own existence” or “every person has a sense of self in relation to other.”

And the second statement is also true in a relative sense. When something is perceived as an object, a subject (self) also is perceived. But these are just useful concepts that are overlaid on experience.

The question of immediate or direct knowledge and what this means is more subtle and needs to be broken down further. A while ago in another thread, we discussed this in a little more depth and I recall that you posited that existence of self was linked or grounded in self awareness or cognizance. This idea (which you should correct if I am misrecalling) is interesting. Buddhist meditation has a thread that runs through it. It is called different things at different stages of the path. In shamatha (mindfulbess) mediation there is a concept called shezhin (Tibetan) that could be translated as “presently knowing” or alertness. Shamatha is a dualistic meditation practice in that it involves a meditator and an object of meditation (the breath or other object in the case of shamatha with support or nowness as an object of meditation in the case of shamatha without support).

Shamatha transitions to vipashyana (awareness) mediation. This involves a beginning of the giving up of the project of meditation itself. It is a transition to an understanding of shunyata and prajna (translated as “best knowing” or insight). Prajna is the same operative aspect of mind as shezhin, but not rigidly tied to subject and object.

The trouble is that, while we can talk about this, talking about it isn’t the same as the experience. Furthermore, conceptualizing it distorts the understanding. Sometimes instead of a discussion a metaphor or an analogy is used. For example, one of the images for prajna is a candle flame. Unlike a flashlight shining on an object, the candle flame is self-illuminating.

Perhaps (one) difference in your view and a Buddhist view is the extent to which you equate this quality of cognizance as the basis for saying that there is a self that exists. A Buddhist would not say that.

I’m unlikely to be making it to disciplinary conferences in the next year or two; it’ll be more likely to happen in later years when I have more vacation time saved up (and/or there’s a conference close to Boston, as the AAR will be in 2017).

It’s a neat idea, though. Justin is right to wonder what conference would have us, but I think the obvious answer is the SACP (where I first met both Thill and Ethan). They’re much more open to the kind of inquiry we get into here. They also host panels at the APA.

“And causation, as a feature of reason and not the empirical realm, cannot itself be proven or disproved, but must be trusted (we must have faith, Kant used ‘glaube,’ in such things) because it holds such explanatory power in our lived experience.”

This rather “Humean” in its tenor. I am with Reid in his rejection of Hume’s views on causality.

Btw, if causality holds such “explanatory power in our lived experience”, how is this possible? (a la Kant’s own famous type of question!)

Jim: “To say that holders of the position are insincere, stupid or mentally ill is to make an ad hominum attack.”

There is a serious misunderstanding here shared by others on this blog.

I am not arguing that a position is absurd because the person advocating it is insincere, stupid, or suffering from a mental disorder. Yes, that would be an ad hominem fallacy.

Rather, I am arguing that if it is shown that a position is absurd, and patently so, then an explanation of why a philosopher would advocate a patently absurd or false view must invoke either insincerity or mere profession of it (the most charitable one!), stupidity, irrationality, or mental disorder.

This has nothing to do with the ad hominem fallacy. It is simply an explanation of why someone advocates a patently absurd or false view.

I’m sorry, I must have missed your question on “epistemic humility”. Let me know what thread it is in and I will try to find it and respond.

In terms of absurd positions, I expect that there are — but I wouldn’t expect to find them in any of the philosophies and religions that have been studied and practiced for hundreds or thousands of years. For example, I could take the Buddhist position and say that a theistic view is a mistaken view. But I wouldn’t say that the views of a Christian philosopher or mystic are absurd. It is more interesting to ask what an intelligent Christian means by “god” than to end the discussion by saying that the view is absurd and the holder of the view unintelligent or disingenuous.

This is why I continue to enjoy my discussions with you, even though you hold views on the existence of a self that I expect are wrong. I still have a lot of questions on this point — such as: (i) would you view self as existing in a non-relative sense, independent of “other” — which would essentially be a theistic view?, (ii) where do you locate self in a person — in the body, in the speech or emotional or energetic quality of a person, or in the mind?, (iii) how do you integrate the fact of impermanence with the view that self exists and whether this results in self becoming a fluid concept, more of a process than a thing?, and (iv) is it possible to definitively understand self through logic or when we self-reflect are we invariably holding ourselves at arms length and, effectively, treating a concept of self as other (in other words, is it possible, by analogy, that the eye can see itself or that a knife can cut itself)?

So, I certainly would not say that your views are absurd. And for most others, I would be slow to apply that label. I might make an exception for a Mormon missionary at my door on a Sunday, if I want to get back to my NY Times!

Jim: “In terms of absurd positions, I expect that there are — but I wouldn’t expect to find them in any of the philosophies and religions that have been studied and practiced for hundreds or thousands of years.”

If you are ruling out absurdity in the “philosophies and religions that have been studied and practiced for hundreds or thousands of years” merely on those grounds, then this is a fallacy, the fallacy of appealing to a tradition and its venerability.

A lot of irrational beliefs and practices have also been around for hundreds or thousands of years and it would be ridiculous to think that mere fact of their persistence for that length of time somehow makes them rational, e.g., the cruel Religious sacrificial rituals of the Mayans, female genital mutilation, Sati or self-immolation by the Hindu widow, etc.

“I could take the Buddhist position and say that a theistic view is a mistaken view.”

Obviously, you can do this only by assuming that Buddhism is justified in denying the existence of a creator God. But what makes that assumption tenable?

“But I wouldn’t say that the views of a Christian philosopher or mystic are absurd.”

Does it matter which views of a “Christian philosopher or mystic” we are talking about? Or do you think that the mere fact that someone is a “Christian philosopher or mystic” automatically confers on that person’s views an inviolable immunity against the charges of absurdity or falsity?

Just because a “Christian philosopher or mystic” claims that one entity is also at the same time three entities, or that the same entity in the form of the “Son” can cry out to itself while miserably dying on the cross “Eloi Eloi Lama Sabachthani” (Why has thou forsaken me?, doesn’t mean that these bizarre claims miraculously become plausible ones!

“It is more interesting to ask what an intelligent Christian means by “god” than to end the discussion by saying that the view is absurd and the holder of the view unintelligent or disingenuous.”

Have you considered the likelihood and plausibility of the charge of absurdity In Light Of a proffered definition of “God”? Or does the mere fact that a “Christian philosopher or mystic” offers a definition of “God” makes it automatically coherent and immune to the charge of absurdity?

I don’t know why you persist in this vicious caricature of my position as one of raising the charge of absurdity prior to an examination of the views. I have consistently offered arguments in support of any charge of absurdity I’ve raised against a view or position.

You can disagree with my arguments or objections, but you must stop perpetuating your vicious caricature of my approach!

On the “self” problem or alleged problem, why don’t we finally lay the ghost to rest?

This can be done if you would kindly tell me in plain words what it is that you are denying when you are denying the self. Obviously, you would first have to clarify what you understand by “self”.

Be kind enough also to next clarify what follows from your denial.

“There is no self!”

So what?

Pray, do not jump into this first. Pl. follow the logical sequence. Thanks!

Excuse me? Are you suggesting that I was unaware of the meanings of “vicious”?
I’m sure that you are aware that not all senses or connotations of a word are intended when it is used.
So, “vicious” in the sense of “bad” (morally wrong) certainly holds!
It is certainly a BAD (morally wrong) caricature of my position to keep portraying it as one which dubs views or claims as absurd prior to an examination of them and one which dismisses views or claims by means of an ad hominem attack on their proponents.
I have pointed this out on earlier occasions, but the persistence of the vicious caricature (read “bad caricature”) sorely tries my patience.

And my injunction to you holds as well, Thill. You have tried my patience on many occasions in the past here; I haven’t written to cast aspersions on your moral character for doing it. I really don’t think it’s that hard to keep discourse at a civil level that doesn’t attack the people you’re talking to; if you sincerely find it difficult, I would be happy to offer some suggestions.

By telling Jim his statements are immoral (and doubly so by using a word as strong as “vicious”), you are crossing the line into personal attacks. You are welcome to make that sort of statement on your own blogs all you want, or in any other venue that permits it. You are not to do it here. Do I make myself clear?

Does this imply that I think that Jim is a vicious person? Honestly, (Jim are you listening?) I don’t think he is a vicious person or has a vicious character, but he is, in my view, engaging in some viciousness in consistently purveying that caricature of me.

Given the nature of the caricature and its variance with my actual practice, it remains a “vicious caricature” in the senses I’ve clarified.

It’s curious that you are using a double standard here, one for the purveyors of the caricatures (and I can’t say you are not guilty of lending credence to it in some of your own comments on my views) and another for me.

The disparity in the language you use to address others and myself is also very curious. I can only hope that this isn’t a reflection of some underlying resentment or grudge.

I find it very odd that you take exception to the justified use of strong words such as “absurd”, “inane”, “vicious”, and so on. Is this a vestige or remnant of the fascist PC-style of policing every expression on “Ivory tower” campuses?

These sort of boarding school style “injunctions” are not to my taste. If Jim has a problem with my language, he can point that out and I can sort it out with him in just the way I sorted it out with Ethan without your intervention.

Anyway, it’s your blog and your prerogative to police the language of its contributors as you please.

I don’t presume to speak for Jim; whatever his feelings on the matter, this policy is not about him. I intend to make this blog a welcoming and enjoyable environment for all participants, not merely those who enjoy being described as vicious, pathological, morally wrong, suffering from a cognitive/mental disorder, and so on. Again, it is really not that difficult to engage in philosophical debate without resorting to these sorts of accusations; I’ve said a bit here about why this is.

You don’t have to like this policy and you don’t have to agree with it. But if you intend to post comments on this blog, you must abide by it.

I thought I was reasonably clear. I don’t like to use the term absurd becasue it ends discussion and leads to a view that a holder of a position is “stupid” or “disingenous”. Positions can be wrong and still further understanding. Furthermore, if you view philosophy or religion as a path, even views that are not ultimately correct can be positive. For example, if one believes in god and is inspired by Christian teachings to live a life devoted to others, one could do worse.

Of course we need to test tradition in the crucible of experience. But it is a mistake to be dismissive of long standing traditions. And it leads to a lack of curiosity and a blindness to what is actually being thought and practiced in the traditions. It is hard enough to see past our own preconceptions and cultural biases and an inclination to immediately categorize different views into categories of right and wrong and absurd makes it nearly impossible.

“But it is a mistake to be dismissive of long standing traditions. And it leads to a lack of curiosity and a blindness to what is actually being thought and practiced in the traditions.”

Again, it’s a fallacy if your sole ground is the fact that the tradition is “long standing”. This is so obvious that I am puzzled why you keep making this sort of claim.

Well, one only needs a cursory conversation with the adherents of these “long standing traditions” to see how curious and perceptive they are. Try a Catholic or a Sri Vaishnavite (adherents of the Vishnu cult in India)!

To rationally judge a position or claim absurd does not imply that we cannot learn anything from it. The mere fact that one has rationally judged it as absurd implies that one has understood or discerned something important about its status or nature, namely, its absurdity! And from the fact that a claim is absurd, important philosophical consequences may follow.

Are you going to respond to my four questions on your claims on the “Self”? I don’t see much point in further discussion if you don’t clarify these questions. I know that you have made comments in earlier exchanges, but it may be useful to bring them together by way of formulating clear answers to these questions. I appreciate your time and effort.

1. What do you mean by “self”?
2. What do you mean by “There is no self”?
3. Why do you claim that there is no self?
4. Supposing it is true that there is no self, what follows?

OK. I’ll try. And perhaps you will answer my questions above as well. The first three questions are related.

1. What is self? / What is no self? / Why is there no self? I work as a lawyer. When I was in law school my landlord was renovating a carriage house out back behind the apartment where I lived. The carriage house was built in the 1800s and was grandfathered under the building codes. As a result, it could be renovated but could not be razed in favor of a new structure. The building was in awful shape with bowed walls and a leaking roof. So, what my landlord did was place lolly columns at the corners of the building to support the roof. Then he tore down and rebuilt the walls and the floor. After these were built he took out the looly columns so the old roof was resting on the new walls. Then he tore off and replaced the old roof. What he was left with was a new building that was still grandfathered under the laws.

This, of course, is an analogy for self. It is something that we have strong attachment to and we feel viscerally that it exists, it has reality in in the context of a conventional life and in relation to other. But it exists only in relation to other and has no intrinsic nature or permanence. And if you look for it even in the context of a single moment in time, it has no core. It is, essentially, a concept.

This is not to say that nothing exists. To say that we don’t exist would be reify the other side of a dualistic split. It might be most accurate to say that we exist in a relative sense because we don’t exist. In other words, existence depends on non-existence. It is like saying that a fire is hot because ice is cold. Hot cannot be conceived of independent from cold. Perhaps it is possible to have direct perception that is not based on this dualism, but that is something we have to look into ourselves and maybe keep an open mind about.

2. Supposing it is true that there is no self, what follows? I would say, a sense of humor. Of course, if we believe in a sense of self where self doesn’t exist, the world is a continual nuisance and a problem and it is quite horrific. Since what we look to as confirmation of self is compounded (our bodies, our friends, our careers, our wealth) it is constantly falling apart and needs perpetual maintenance. So, what follows from no self in our conventional lives is suffering. What follows from a realization of no self (even an imperfect, largely intellectual realization of no self) is great relief. Also, compassion arises. There is no explaining that, but they seem to go together. As Tulku Urgyen has said, “emptiness without compassion is never taught, water will always be wet.”

Other than that, the world doesn’t change. Just a different perspective that seems to cheer you up. Like the Zennies say, “After enlightenment, the laundry.”

“…even views that are not ultimately correct can be positive. For example, if one believes in god and is inspired by Christian teachings to live a life devoted to others, one could do worse.”

I don’t think that irrationality, i.e, holding a belief in the absence of evidence, and, worse, in the face of contrary evidence, can be positive in the long run. You are focusing only on one alleged effect of being inspired by “Christian teachings” and excluding other likely or patent negative effects. This is a fallacy of selection.

It is also problematic to deem “devotion to others” as positive in itself without careful consideration of what form it takes, what it involves, and the manifest effects or results. One can readily think of instances of “devotion to others” which are harmful to oneself and the others, e.g., the “devotion” which takes the form of wanting to “save the souls” of others.

Also, it is a fallacy of irrelevance to talk about the positive psychological or moral effects of a belief when its truth or plausibility is the issue.

Ethan, I agree that I need to consider more carefully the issue of explaining why a philosopher holds a patently absurd view.

To say that she is merely professing something she doesn’t really believe in is only a starter!

The question then is why she would do so.

Could be other factors here than stupidity or irrationality or mental disorder?

Frivolity? Is that distinct from joking?

How about wanting to play “L’enfant terrible”? Is there an “adult” version of this tendency and is it at work in a philosopher who advocates patently bizarre or absurd views? LOL

How about “ideological function”? That is, is the absurd view in question serving in some way, perhaps even by diversion of attention from structures of ruling group exploitation, to legitimize the interests of the ruling group? Does the advocacy of skepticism or (hard) determinism serve this sort of an ideological function?

It is important to note that Amod’s recent criticisms of my style of commenting was triggered by my statement to Jim that he is free to disagree with my objections, but that he should not engage in vicious caricature or misrepresentation of them as merely ad hominem attacks.

He has indeed made much ado about my use of “vicious” in this context, despite my clarifications, and now seems to be using this instance to draw a damaging portrait of my comments on this blog.

Anyone reading Amod’s remarks is very likely to think that all I have been doing in my comments on this blog is to condemn in uncivil language the views I disagree with and to launch personal attacks on their adherents.
This is, to say the least, unfair to the facts.

Anyone who does bother to read my own comments will see that I have offered criticism of certain views and claims on rational grounds.

No doubt, after examining those views and claims, I have judged them to be “absurd”, “inane”, “incoherent”, “irrational”, “pathological”, and, yes, “vicious” in the sense of “bad” and “logically flawed”.

These are strong judgments, but the issue is whether reasons have been given in support of them and whether the reasons justify the judgments.

Amod diverts our attention to an irrelevant issue: whether one ought to make strong judgments at all!

When someone claims that it makes sense to say that in addressing me with a sentence beginning with my name “Thill”, they are not addressing a person or self, but mental processes or a series of mental events, this is assuredly incoherent, bizarre, weird, absurd, irrational, and false.

We don’t talk to, much less scold, or reprimand, or issue injunctions to, mental processes or events! We talk to people, persons, individuals, selves!

This is so obvious that I hope you will admit that it calls for an explanation of why someone would hold a view which either asserts or implies that what we do in talking to anyone is to talk to a series of mental events or a “bundle” of mental processes!

This has been one of my issues of strong interest in recent years. Why do philosophers and theologians (who generally presume and pretend that they are above or superior to common folk, or that they operate at levels superior to common sense) make such weird claims?

(Michael Shermer, take note! Weirdness is not an exclusive property of claims constitutive of “New Age” thinking! You can find university professors with advanced degrees and salaries making these claims as a matter of “profession”!)

If you have read some of my recent comments, particularly in exchanges with Ethan Mills, you will have noticed that I have proposed a few alternative explanatory factors. It is simply untrue that I think that “cognitive or mental disorder” is the only explanation of why someone would hold absurd views.

I have, indeed, said that there is no way a mentally competent adult can sincerely believe and express coherently in a language such as English that he or she doesn’t know anything at all or cannot know anything at all. She must at least know English, if not her own name!
So, why does she then profess skepticism?

If she is mentally competent, and obviously her learned “defense” of skepticism shows that she is mentally competent, she is assuredly insincere in professing to believe in it, i.e., she does not really believe that she does not know anything.

Now, is this an unwarranted and irrelevant personal attack? Not anymore than the claim that “X must have known that Y was not in the car. Therefore, X must have been lying when she claimed that Y was in the car” is an instance of unwarranted personal attack if the evidence supports it.

It is also perfectly legitimate, and possibly very important, to raise the issue: Why, then, did X lie?

In our case, the issue is a similar one: Why do philosophers and/or theologians profess insincerely to believe in skepticism, or No-self theory, or the claim that an entity can also be three separate entities at the same time, etc?

They must have the basic intelligence to understand that skepticism implies that they don’t know any language or their own names, the no-self doctrine or denial of self implies that when they talk to anyone they are talking to a series of mental processes or events, etc!

I don’t see anything intellectually illegitimate in pursuing this line of inquiry, but if Amod is right you can’t even get started on it because in raising the charge of insincerity (or absurdity, or irrationality) you have already committed an unpardonable atrocity in launching a personal attack on the person.

But this leads to a slippery slope.

If you say that a claim is obviously false or absurd, then you are implying that the person does not have the intelligence to see what is obvious. So you are implying that the person has succumbed to stupidity. So you are insulting that person. This is unacceptable. So? Stop making the judgment that a view or claim is obviously false or absurd!

If you say that it is irrational to believe in a claim, then you are implying that the person who believes that claim is irrational. So you are insulting that person. . This is unacceptable. So? Stop making the judgment that a view or claim is irrational!

If you even say that a claim is false, then you are implying that the person who thinks that the claim is true is mistaken, and, therefore, ignorant of the truth. So you are insulting that person. This is unacceptable. So? Stop making the judgment that a view or claim is false!

This effectively, and absurdly, shuts the door on rational, and critically important, evaluations of views or claims.

This is no surprise at all given the reign of subjectivism and narcissism in contemporary North American culture!

“Amod diverts our attention to an irrelevant issue: whether one ought to make strong judgments at all!”

I retract this statement since it is muddled! It’s not an irrelevant issue, but perhaps a trite or trivial one, one with an obvious answer: we make strong judgments in many contexts, and, if they are also rational judgments, they have the perfectly legitimate function of drawing attention to serious flaws which require correction.

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